Just then who should begin to whistle but the bullfinch? His cage was in a dark corner, and at the sound of that unexpected note Johnnie clapped his tiny hands and crowed with delight. Kitty laughed and cried together. And if the bullfinch did not mean, by bursting into song at that moment, to say, “Happy Christmas to all the world, and God bless little Johnnie, and all the children in it!” I don’t know what it meant, and I give up guessing.
“Oh, Johnnie!” said Kitty in a whisper, when she was left alone with her little brother, “something wonderful happened last night. It is like a story.”
“Is it as wonderful as the story of the blue rose?” asked Johnnie in another whisper.
“E-ver, e-ver so much more wonderful! And it is true,” answered Kitty very low and with a nod that conveyed a great deal more than her words. “It was Christmas Eve. I went out, and all the goblins and the elves were out. I saw them and talked to them, but there was Love also taking care of everybody who tried to be good. It is the night when Love has most power, and I saw my guardian child, and my naughty self in the shape of a sprite, and—But hush! some one is coming, and it is a secret.”
THE END
- Transcriber’s Notes:
- Missing or obscured punctuation was corrected.
- Typographical errors were silently corrected.
- Inconsistent spelling and hyphenation were made consistent only when a predominant form was found in this book.